


Orphans

by brightly_lit



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Brotherly Love, Child Abuse, Gen, Geographical Isolation, Hurt Dean Winchester, Hurt Sam Winchester, Hurt/Comfort, Isolation, Kidnapping, Pre-Canon, Religious Fanaticism, Violence, Young Dean Winchester, Young Sam Winchester
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-02
Updated: 2020-10-02
Packaged: 2021-03-07 21:40:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 17,786
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26774536
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/brightly_lit/pseuds/brightly_lit
Summary: After John dies, a young Dean and Sam are kidnapped by hunters and taken to a crumbling stone abbey that sits on a cliff above the sea. They're separated. Dean's situation is bad ... but what the hell are they doing to Sam?
Comments: 4
Kudos: 27
Collections: Supernatural Summergen 2020





	Orphans

**Author's Note:**

  * For [stardustdean](https://archiveofourown.org/users/stardustdean/gifts).



After Dad died when Dean was nine, Dean and Sam lived with Bobby for a couple of years. Then Bobby went on a long hunt and left them with a hunter, who went on a hunt herself and left them with another hunter named Bill. Shortly after they arrived at Bill’s, two hunters named Dennis and Barbara called him up and told him Bobby said he should bring Sam and Dean to them until he got back, and that was how they came to be winding down an almost undetectable dirt road through thick forest at night, Bill cursing and consulting the letter Dennis had sent him containing the directions, muttering about how far it was from the nearest town and how glad he was that Dennis had urged him to bring along an extra can of gas.

Dean got a bad feeling as the place finally came into view, black against the sky, on a cliff above crashing ocean waves, made of stone and half crumbled. Bill said it was the abbey Dennis and Barbara, a priest and a nun, tended. It looked like an evil castle out of an old cartoon.

Dennis and Barbara greeted Bill cordially. When Bill complained that the place was impossible to find, Dennis bashfully read over the letter again to check that he’d gotten the directions right. They had dinner. Barbara asked Sam sweetly whether he’d like to see his room and led him away by the hand. Dennis showed Bill to another room. Dean heard thick wood doors close all around the stone building, leaving him alone there in the cavernous dining room.

That was the last time he saw Sam.

He woke on the dusty burlap bags he’d piled together to sleep on in a hallway near the kitchen. Bill must have left first thing in the morning, his truck gone by the time Dean awoke in the late morning after staying up half the night looking for Sam.

There was no food anywhere, no bed, no soap, nothing. When he finally saw Dennis late that afternoon, he demanded to see Sam. What the hell was this place, and who the hell were these people?

“Sam’s fine,” Dennis said absently.

“I want to see him,” Dean said flatly.

“No.”

Dean looked askance. ‘No’? He hadn’t said anything about starving all day or sleeping in a hallway, but this was unacceptable. “Um, yeah, I’m gonna see him, so take me to him.”

“No,” Dennis said sharply. “And why are the plates from dinner still on the table? Are you so spoiled and incompetent that it never occurred to you to clean them up?”

Dean looked around. Everything about this was bad. This was bad.

Dad had prepared them for all kinds of situations. Dean could hunt and cheat and charm and steal, but nothing had ever prepared him for anything like this. Do the dinner dishes?? Doing the dinner dishes with Dad pretty much involved throwing away the can or the bag, and living with Bobby wasn’t much different. He didn’t know what to say, but if doing the dinner dishes was what it would take, he would do them. “And get tonight’s dinner started. We can’t live on cold cuts.”

Dean had hunted around the kitchen for something edible that morning, and found nothing but bags of grain. He’d finally snarfed a couple of ripe tomatoes he’d found in a courtyard garden while casing the place. “With what?” Dean snarked.

Narrowing his eyes, Dennis led Dean to the garden, then to the kitchen, where he pointed out those bags of grain. “You can slaughter a chicken, too. They’re down by the pasture. Also, the cherries are ripe.”

Dean was getting pretty freaked out. Forcing Dean to serve them just so he might get to see Sam sometime ... this was nuts. And maybe impossible. “Um ... I don’t know how to cook.”

With an annoyed sigh, Dennis took down three of the books that stood on a dusty shelf and slammed them on the counter in front of Dean. Cookbooks probably, from the faded pictures of vegetables, fruits, and cuts of meat on the front of one, but ancient, Dean would guess from the 1920s or before. Dean was so out of his depth ... but would work with whatever he got.

“And then you’ll let me see Sam.”

“How many times do I have to tell you no? Are you slow?”

“Listen, buddy, you’re taking me to Sam, period. Now.”

Dennis slapped him, hard, across the face.

After feeling at his cheek in disbelief, Dean immediately turned and threw a punch at Dennis, only to get elbowed in the face and then tripped onto the floor. Dennis’s movements were quick and efficient. For a priest, he sure knew how to fight.

Now that he was on the floor anyway, Dean went for his legs, trying to kick them out from under him, but Dennis saw his intention instantly and instead kicked Dean three times in his middle in quick succession, so hard it knocked the wind out of him. As Dean gasped futilely for breath, Dennis grabbed him by the hair and yanked him upright. “Listen here, you little shit. I voted to kill you as soon as Bill was gone, but Barbara said we could put you to work. So guess what, if we can’t get any work out of you, the only thing you’re good for is compost for the garden.”

Dean’s ability to breathe had partly come back as Dennis spoke. “What are you doing to Sam?” he managed to choke out.

“Unlike you, Sam has value. We would never hurt Sam. So as hard as it’ll be for someone like you not to be nothing but trouble to everyone around you, I suggest you find it in you to try.” Dennis let him go and stalked out of the room, leaving Dean there holding his chest, his cheek, and ... well, lots of parts of him hurt after being knocked onto the stone floor--knees, elbows, just ... everything. He crawled over to lean against a cabinet as he got his breath back while he thought over what he’d heard.

He knew this place was bad news the second he laid eyes on it. It was worse than he ever could have imagined, though, and it wasn’t even full of monsters, but regular humans, who were crafty and fast and brutal and better at fighting than Dean, which was not something he often encountered. And they wanted to kill him.

And maybe Sam, too, despite Dennis’s reassurances, yet ... Dean had some reason to believe he was telling the truth. The solicitous way Barbara had spoken to Sam as she led him away made it seem as if she was very enchanted with him indeed, and Dennis was nice to Sam, too, acting like he was eager to meet him, while come to think of it, Dennis hadn’t greeted Dean upon his arrival, and Barbara hadn’t even looked at him once all through dinner. Anyway, Dennis had told Dean what he did with bodies, and there were no fresh mounds in the garden that morning.

Still, he had to see Sam to know for sure. His first thought was resistance--if he couldn’t beat Dennis in a fight, he could at least resist--but the unfeeling chill in his voice when he told Dean he’d sooner kill him if he couldn’t get him to work made clear he would do it--tonight, even. Like he’d be glad to prove to Barbara Dean wasn’t worth keeping around.

It rankled every part of him to do it, as he finally got himself to his feet, feeling for broken ribs, but he opened one of those cookbooks.

So now all was explained about leaving him to fend for himself for a place to sleep. At least in this enormous edifice that must have been built forever ago to house many monks or nuns, he had some options. Clearly no one had lived here for decades, as many of the stone walls had crumbled. Maybe it even once held services for the public; Dean figured the big room he could see from the outside with stained-glass windows that reached up two stories or more must be the chapel.

Yet as he explored every corner, Dean discovered only the kitchen, dining room, and connected hallways were open to him. Every time Dennis went back into the abbey’s interior, Dean could hear the heavy wood bar clank into place to keep Dean out, the only kind of lock this place had. Dean found a private corner at the end of that same caved-in hallway where he spent his first night here, and added whatever was the closest thing to something warm and soft he could find to the pile of burlap he’d made then. No one ever seemed to go there.

Also, Dean finally found some soap in the back of a cupboard, which appeared to be homemade, only there was no running water here, just a hand-crank well in the garden. Dennis was always making him bring him pails full of water, getting more and more irritated that there weren’t more, until Dean finally just brought in a couple every time he went outside, and left them in the hallway Dennis went down--the same hallway where Dean left the meals he prepared them--and finally Dennis seemed more or less satisfied. Still, now that he had some soap, Dean managed to at least get a little cleaner every now and then before he had to go garden or clean or cook or slaughter an animal or some other kind of dirty work.

He wondered about Sam. Did they give him access to soap? Sam was kind of a fastidious kid. What sort of slavery were they making him engage in? And what was so “valuable” about him to them? Sometimes, Dean was almost glad for the work, because it kept his mind from spiralling down very dark paths about what they could be doing to Sam right now. He had to see him. He just had to.

He got to sooner than he expected. Dean was preparing lunch to the best of his ability when Dennis came into the kitchen. Dean jumped back when Dennis reached for the knife in his hand, but Dennis just said, “I’ll take over. Go get clean. Totally clean. Haven’t you ever considered washing your clothes?” He rolled his eyes, but went on chopping the tomato Dean was going to put on the chicken sandwiches. “Put on some clean ones.”

Dean went and got a change of clothes out of his bag, then went out to the garden and washed up thoroughly, glad for the opportunity. He’d wondered if he might get in trouble for using the soap or spending time doing something other than work, so it was nice to be told straight out he could.

When he got back inside, Dennis was putting the sandwiches on the table in the huge dining room, with a bowl full of cherries Dean had picked--basically the same thing they’d had every meal every day since Dean started cooking for them. Dean saw that Dennis had put down four plates. He just had time to register what this meant when he heard the door into the area where they kept Sam open, and he heard Sam’s voice. Dean ran toward it, shouting his name.

“Dean!” Sam ran to him and hugged him.

Dean hugged him tight, feeling that he was all right--he really seemed to be all right--whole, not limping or in pain. Only after he’d absorbed this did he start to notice everything else. They’d shaved Sam’s head. Dean pressed his hand against the short fuzz. Sam had preferred his hair longish since he was four. “They shaved your head?” he asked wonderingly. Sam now had thin golden earrings--well, really, just a long thread--that connected on each side to another thread that went around his neck. Dean touched his earlobes. “They pierced your ears?” he asked, bewildered. Sam wore long, white silk robes with royal blue edging and gold details. “What--?”

“See? All your worry was for naught, both of you,” Dennis said pleasantly, pulling out a chair. “Sit, Sam.”

Sam clutched Dean’s hands, staring up into his face anxiously--hands which also had thin golden chains jingling on them--but after only a few moments, obeyed Dennis’s command. Dean still had bruises and sore spots to remind him to obey Dennis. What had they done to Sam to convince him of the same thing?

They all sat down around the table. Dean kept looking over Sam, looking for bruises or scratches, any sign of abuse, and couldn’t see anything, but since almost his whole body was hidden from Dean’s view under those robes, there really was no telling. The chains ran along the backs of his hands to a bracelet from a golden ring around his middle finger. Another chain disappeared up his sleeve from the bracelet. Sam didn’t seem fearful, though, which was in the end the only thing that could really reassure Dean.

“Sam absolutely insisted we all always eat together,” Dennis said, shaking his head but smiling fondly at Sam. Sam said nothing, but his expression was steely.

“What do they have you doing in there?” Dean had to ask.

Sam’s answer was guarded, but he didn’t seem to be trying to say anything to Dean in code. “Just ... religious rituals, I guess.”

Nothing that had happened since they’d arrived in this place had made any sense, but somehow, this was the one thing Dean really couldn’t get his mind around. “Wh-- what??”

“Sam’s special,” Barbara said, beaming creepily at Sam.

“He has special abilities,” Dennis went on proudly.

“We’re helping him hone them,” Barbara said.

Dean looked quickly at Sam, quickly enough to see his expression darken when Barbara said this. He didn’t seem scared, but whatever it was they were making him do, Sam didn’t like it.

Lunch passed with Dennis and Barbara doing most of the talking. Sometimes, Dean or Sam tried to talk to each other, to ask or communicate something they weren’t sure Dennis and Barbara would allow, and sure enough, if they didn’t like the direction the question was going, they loudly talked over them. Barbara especially was good at peppering Sam with questions and observations until he lost track of what he’d been trying to say.

At the end of lunch, after letting them hug one last time (Dean’s attempt to exchange some real information at a whisper was lost in Dennis’s seemingly deliberate loud blather), Barbara led Sam back into the forbidden area, Dennis smiling until they were gone, whereupon Dennis grabbed Dean by the shirt and dragged him into the kitchen. “Why are there no eggs?? Where’s all the milk? I didn’t find a thing in the root cellar! Chicken-and-tomato sandwiches and a bowl of cherries every single meal?? What the fuck is wrong with you?!”

“It’s all that was there! It’s what you told me to make!” Dean cried.

Dennis slapped him, then not seeming satisfied, slapped him again, harder. “It never occurred to you to collect the eggs?? Have you really just let them sit there all this time? And the milk?? Have you milked a single sheep??”

“I’ve never done anything like that! I’m sorry! I don’t know how!”

Dean cringed, cringed harder when Dennis let him go, expecting a vicious beating, but instead Dennis, with a great sigh, said, “Then I’ll show you.”

He led him to the animal pens whence Dean had retrieved the chickens for the sandwiches. He showed him how to milk the sheep. He warned him not to slaughter the sow, and told him which pigs he could slaughter and when. “Remember, animals generally taste best when they’re young. And males are useless; you only need to keep one around to fertilize the females.” Dean couldn’t help wondering if he was talking about Dean and Sam when he talked about males being ‘useless.’ Were they just fattening up Sam and Dean to eat later? Maybe they really were monsters.

“You need to scythe hay for the animals to eat during the winter. I’ll help you do that. And we need to harvest the wheat soon. I’ll help you with that, too, and show you how to thresh it.”

Dennis took him to the garden and told him what each kind of plant was and how to harvest it.

The more Dennis had to explain to Dean, the more irritated he got, especially as Dean had to ask a lot of questions. Better to ask now, when Dennis was in a relatively good mood. “Did your father teach you nothing about how to live?” Dennis finally asked condescendingly.

“Yes!” Dean snapped. “He taught us all about how to live in this century!”

“Oh ... all that credit-card thievery he was always engaging in,” Dennis sniffed.

“You knew my dad??” Dean asked, stunned. Dad spent time with this freak??

“Sure, sure. We were hunting buddies for a bit, with Pastor Jim. Do you know Pastor Jim?”

“Yes.” Pastor Jim knew this creep, too?? “Were you hunting with Dad the day he died?” Dean could not help but ask bluntly.

Dennis sneered at him. “Oh, you think I killed your father? I didn’t. We had a falling out a couple of years before that. I hadn’t seen him since.”

“What did you fall out over?” It didn’t surprise Dean at all that Dad had ultimately decided this bastard wasn’t the sort of person he ought to be acquainted with.

“We had a big fight. Your father was a moral absolutist. He couldn’t see the forest for the trees. That’s all your dad ever did, was chop down trees. But you’ll see, when you start chopping trees for firewood--you’ll need to do that, too--that even if you tried to chop down every tree in this forest, by the time you got done, a whole new forest would have grown in its place. That’s what monsters are like. You kill one here or there, a dozen more sprout up while you’re at it. We needed a bigger weapon, and I’d discovered that your father had one in his possession--an amazing weapon, if it could just be honed and developed properly ... but he refused. Your father was ill-tempered, stubborn, unpleasant--well, you know this, because you’re exactly like him. But he was also a fool. I always knew that in the end the only thing that could kill John Winchester was his own folly. So we moved back here, to wait until opportunity finally knocked. And here you are.” He gestured pleasantly at Dean, and in the direction of the chapel.

“‘Back’ here?”

“Yes. We grew up here, Barbara and I. It used to be an orphanage, run by nuns and one extremely cruel priest. We had to attend services in that chapel every day, and pray for our souls.” He pointed to the part of the abbey that had tall, ornate windows that looked down onto the courtyard.

“This place fell down since, I guess.”

“Yes. I looked into having it restored, but the cost was excessive. Most of it is still standing and as functional as ever. The stained-glass windows--somehow, they’re still in perfect condition, can you believe that? East-facing, even, bearing the brunt of the wind. The chapel’s still in great shape. It’s enough to make even a heathen like you a believer, though fools always manage to find some way to deny His existence. Honestly, I’m kind of glad the parts that caved in did. Too many memories.”

As Dennis spent the rest of the afternoon showing Dean the countless chores he was supposed to be tending to, Dean contemplated all he’d learned. Dad knew this guy?? Dad had some powerful weapon Dennis wanted to get his hands on to kill monsters with? Somehow, Dean and Sam’s arrival was the opportunity he’d been waiting for? Well, Sam’s ... Sam’s arrival? Dean looked up at the windows, looming above the garden courtyard. Just what the hell were they doing to him in there?

“The peaches are ripe,” Dennis told him one morning as Dean scrubbed the morning dishes in a basin. “You need to go out and harvest them, then preserve them.”

“... How?”

“Preserves, jam. Use the honey or the maple syrup for sweetener. There’s all the canning jars here you could ever need.” He opened the door to a pantry Dean had only glanced in once, the first day, and seeing it contained no food, never looked again. It was indeed full of an incredible number of jars. “I think you can handle making preserves yourself, but I’m going to supervise it when you start canning vegetables, or I’m sure you’ll manage to kill us all. Any flawed fruit, give to me to make wine and vinegar from. I’ll be handling that duty--I know too much about your genetic predispositions to let you anywhere near alcohol.” Dennis rolled his eyes. “Anyway, you need to get on harvesting today, or wild animals will get it all. Oh--pies are good, also.”

“Wait--pies??” Was this a trick?

“Yes, but they don’t keep more than a few days, so only make one when you plan to serve it. But you can also preserve the filling in jars so we can have pie all winter.”

“Yes, sir!”

Dennis frowned, seeming to wonder what was this new attitude and assuming it was some kind of sarcasm, but as soon as Dennis was gone, Dean dropped what he was doing, grabbed some buckets, and ran out to the orchard. Finally, one good thing had happened. Well, two: he and Sam were still alive.

As he said he would, Dennis supervised as Dean learned how to can the vegetables from the garden. “Even if your father never taught you anything else useful, I assume he taught you how to hunt?”

Dean glowered. “You can’t ever say one good word about my dad?” he finally muttered.

“He was a ruthless and effective hunter. How’s that?”

Dean said nothing, trying to hide his fury behind an expressionless mask.

“I asked you a question, Dean: Can you hunt?”

“Yes.”

“I don’t mean for monsters, I mean for animals in the forest.”

“I know that’s what you meant.”

“I figured you must, since you knew how to process the animal carcasses. Great, then stop slaughtering our animals and start hunting in the forest from now on. Especially once autumn hits, hunt as many animals as you can; it’ll preserve our own flocks so they can reproduce in spring, and the winter cold will keep the carcasses fresh ’til spring. Just don’t waste anything; don’t ever let anything rot.”

“Okay.”

“Also, you need to start cutting down trees so we have wood for the winter. Cut down any tree you want, as long as it’s fully grown, more or less. Just don’t cut down any tree that has something carved in it, or I will kill you. I mean it.”

Dean flinched and looked at his face to see if he was joking. He wasn’t. What the hell??

“That’s really not the way to motivate a guy.”

“What, you can’t tell when something’s been carved into a tree?” he asked, ridiculing.

“You know Bobby’s gonna come looking for us,” said Dean.

“No, he won’t,” Dennis said casually.

“Yes, he will!” Dean insisted. Of course Bobby would. He knew he would.

“He’ll probably try. But there are about sixty turns off the highway to get here, many of them unmarked. It’s not on any maps. He’d never find it.”

“But Bill’s been here! He could lead him back.”

Dennis laughed. “Bill could hardly find his way here. Besides, I kept the letter with the directions. I told him my directions were flawed, that I couldn’t quite remember exactly how to get here or back, and to just keep heading west and he’d find his way out. Either he succeeded, or ....” He shrugged.

Dean tried to hide his dismay.

“No one will ever find you here,” Dennis went on pleasantly, “so you may as well embrace your situation. It’s not going to improve. Get to work on that firewood, or we’ll all freeze to death when the weather turns.”

“I tied a rope around every tree you’re not allowed to cut,” Dennis said one day as he returned from the forest for lunch. “That way, there’ll be no mistakes.”

It was easier for Dennis to spend an entire morning doing that than to kill Dean? That seemed like progress. Or maybe he’d finally figured out Dean wasn’t about to risk cutting a single tree if it might just lead to his death.

“In fact, let’s go out there this afternoon and cut down some trees. There’s different methods that work better for different kinds of trees. I’ll show you.”

Dean dutifully followed him out there. There was a definite chill in the air. Dennis noticed it, too. “You feel that? That’s why we need firewood. The abbey is chilly even in summer; icicles hang from the rafters in winter.”

Dean watched and learned, mostly about how much damn work this was going to be, but as Dennis hacked away at tree limbs, Dean couldn’t help looking around at the trees with ropes tied around them, which were concentrated in this area--in fact, Dennis seemed to want to clear away every evergreen in this whole part of the forest, to let the deciduous trees with things carved in them have plenty of room to flourish.

When Dennis told him to get behind him so he could fell a tall tree, Dean did as instructed, looking up hauntedly at the carving in the smooth white bark of another tree, only to realize that, though on most trees the scar had grown and warped until it obscured what was written, this one’s carving was fresh, and it was a name: Evelyn. “Who’s Evelyn?” said Dean as the evergreen crashed to the ground.

At the dark look Dennis gave him, Dean took a couple of steps back, but Dennis just gazed at the writing. “My sister,” he said at last, and turned back to hack off more of the evergreen’s limbs.

“I didn’t know you had a sister.”

“I had dozens. Brothers, too. All the children in the orphanage were my brothers and sisters.”

“Oh.” There was a heaviness to the way Dennis was working now.

“We weren’t allowed to make graves or even gravestones for them when they died. They were to be composted or fed to the pigs. Any memorial discovered anywhere on the grounds was destroyed, everyone punished. But the trees ... the trees remain.” He pointed at one of the most obscured names. “That was one of the first ones we carved. It was already a full-grown tree then, but that was forty years ago, and this tree hasn’t even reached middle age.”

Dean looked around, getting freaked out as he saw more and more trees with ropes around them. “Looks like ... a lot of them died,” he said, his voice faltering.

“Dozens so far, though none of us has reached old age yet. Some were killed here, when they were children. Many. Others committed suicide after we escaped, or got involved in some sort of self-destructive lifestyle. More than half are gone already, that I know of; it could be more. I carve their name on another tree whenever I find out about a new one. It’s very difficult to survive a childhood like ours. That is, even if you make it to adulthood ... it’s hard to live with the scars, the memories. Terribly hard.”

He tossed down the axe and picked up the saw again. “That’s why Barbara and I are so glad we found Sam. Sam has the power to eradicate a tremendous amount of evil in the world single-handedly. Not the kind of evil Barbara and I endured--though we explored the possibility the priest was some kind of monster or demon, in the end we concluded he was human--but enough evil to make this world a much brighter place. I’m not sure Barbara and I could have survived if we hadn’t believed such a thing could one day come to pass. Okay, you try.”

Dean took over with the saw, doing as Dennis had taught him.

“Good,” said Dennis as he watched. “Now you just have to do this with about forty trees, then saw them into logs, and finally chop them into firewood, and we’ll have enough for the winter.” Dennis tossed the gloves to Dean and headed back to the abbey.

Forty trees?? It took him an hour to saw through a smallish tree to cut it down, a good half hour to cut a single thick log .... Chopping the firewood wasn’t too bad after that, but this was exhausting, tedious work. He tried to cut at least a couple of logs a day, but his arm was too tired to do more after that. Anyway, if he turned forty damn trees into firewood, he wouldn’t have time for anything else. Dennis was asking the impossible. Where was a chainsaw when you needed one? He could have it done in a day if he had one of those.

Dean was even more incensed when Dennis then took him out to a pile of rotted plants in the courtyard and informed him he was going to teach him how to make rope from the stuff. “We’re low on rope now, since I used so much on the trees, and you never want to run out of rope.”

Dean couldn’t suppress the fervent wish that Dennis needed more so he could hang himself. He settled down to watch ... and immediately scoffed. “You have got to be kidding me.”

Dennis stood up with barely suppressed irritation from where he’d bent, rubbing the stems over a piece of wood to soften them and then combing them through a thing that was like a hairbrush made of nails pounded through another piece of wood. After all that work, he’d gotten what looked like could be made into about a foot of rope. “What about this is amusing, Dean?”

“You expect me to chop forty trees into firewood, in addition to feeding and milking and slaughtering the animals, doing all the cooking, and now this, too??”

“All those things will constitute only a fraction of all your duties, Dean. I just haven’t had time to show you everything yet.”

“Fuck this.” Dean started out of the courtyard, stopped by a blow to the side of his head--from Dennis’s booted foot. Dean whirled around in disbelief, furiously sweeping dirt and mud off his face. “You son of a bitch,” he hissed, and lunged for him.

He really thought he was going to get to him first this time, and he might have, except Dennis didn’t hold back at all, never for a second. Where Dean might have pulled a punch to make sure he didn’t seriously hurt a guy, Dennis was not so generous. The board full of nails was right behind Dennis, and though Dean really wished Dennis would just die, he didn’t have it in him to kill a man in a fit of rage.

Dennis had no such qualms. Taking advantage of Dean’s momentary hesitation, he kneed Dean in the ribs, then got him in a chokehold. Dean fought it as hard as he could, elbowing at Dennis, but he was fast losing consciousness, the blood pounding in his ears.

Just as he was about to pass out, Dennis finally let him go, where Dean lay gagging and gasping for breath on the dirt. “I hate you so much,” Dean choked out, struggling to roll over onto his side.

“That’s nice. There’s a cliff edge right over there. How many times I’ve wanted to throw you over. It’d be easy, with you in this condition.”

“Fuck you. A thousand times, fuck you.” Dean groaned, managing to get to a sitting position, breathing hard. “Sam would never forgive you.”

“I’m not sure that matters that much. A broken Sam might be useful, too.”

Dennis must have seen the despair that came over Dean at those words, as then Dennis relaxed his aggressive stance. Dennis really ... for all his shows of respect toward Sam as compared to Dean, he felt no more warmth for an innocent seven-year-old at his mercy?

“All right, now, are you willing to learn how to be useful around here, or is it the cliff for you?”

Dean couldn’t help glancing up at the chapel windows as he silently obeyed. Had Sam seen his utter defeat? His head tingled from where Dennis had kicked it, he felt sick to his stomach, his heart was still pounding in his ears from almost losing consciousness, but the thing that stung intolerably was the humiliation at the thought that his little brother had witnessed it.

Once Dean had finally figured out what he was doing well enough to get done with his daily duties early in the afternoon, he went to the clifftop. He’d already cased the whole place and gotten a good idea of the layout. The chapel took up most of the east wall and part of the south. The entire north wall was rubble, except for a tower that rose out of some part of the building that was still standing, at the highest point, overlooking the ocean.

In his explorations, Dean had noticed the rope strung down the cliffside along steps cut into the rock, but he’d put off going down to the beach since he knew it wouldn’t lead to Sam. Today, though, he had the time. One day, maybe they could make a break for it at mealtime and escape via the ocean.

It was a good thing the rope was there, he discovered as he descended, as a couple of the steps had crumbled. Looking back up at them once he reached the bottom, he realized they must have been there for decades--centuries, even, although the rope was relatively new. At the foot of the steps was a cove ... and a small boat made of wood, that would fit two people at most. Under a rock outcropping, Dean found a box that contained fishing line, hooks, netting, crab traps ... all kinds of things. Was he allowed ...? Of course he was--nay, he was expected to; Dennis had already mentioned one night that fish or crab would be nice for a change.

Another thing that would be nice for a change would be to escape this Alcatraz, however temporarily, and spend some time relaxing in the afternoon sun, fishing. It was Bobby who really liked to fish. He’d taken Dean and Sam out several times. Dean never really saw the appeal, except that it was fun just hanging out doing nothing, spending a little time in nature with the people he loved. Sam liked to drag his hand through the water and try to peer deep enough into the murky depths to identify some sea creatures. It sounded like heaven right now, so far away from this place and his life here, it was hard to believe it ever happened. Dean put some tackle in the boat and pushed off into the cove, paddling out into the middle of it.

He’d found an old straw hat lying around and started using it to keep the sun off, since he was outside so much. After fishing a while, he leaned back, put his hat over his face, and just drifted, for one afternoon forgetting everything that had terrified and tormented him since the dreadful day they arrived here: beatings, constant threats on his life, unnamed threats to Sam, and most of all, endless work. What the hell had happened? More importantly, how were they going to escape?

“Dad,” he murmured, “if you can see us ... sure could use a little help here.”

Thank God at least Dennis was willing to help him harvest the hay. Dean had fully assumed Dennis was just screwing with him, setting him up for failure with all his impossible demands, but Dennis seemed undaunted by the magnitude of the task before them as he started at one corner of the enormous field, methodically scything while Dean stacked it in the wagon and took it up to the barn when it was full. From all Dean had heard and seen about how they grew up, it was likely that this was how he and his brothers and sisters spent their time. Dennis certainly seemed practiced at it.

Dean had healed almost completely from his last beating, and now that he’d figured out more about where to find food and how to prepare it, he was pretty sure he was more valuable to Dennis alive than dead. It was time to lobby for changes, or at least the most important change.

Dean said, “Sam is only seven! He needs time to play.”

“You just want to spend time together so you can plot your escape.”

Dean tried to deny it, blustering with, “Obviously it’s impossible to escape from here.”

“You’re right about that. Absolutely right. So what’s the point?”

“Be--because--Sam’s ... fading.” Sam was pretty chipper every morning, but by lunchtime he was already flagging. At dinner, he just sat and stared, shoveling the food mechanically into his mouth. “Haven’t you ever heard ‘all work and no play’?? I don’t know what you’re doing to him, but if you’re so happy that he’s so smart ... soon he ain’t gonna have much going on in his head without getting to screw around some and do what he wants. It’s what kids do.”

It was an hour before Dennis spoke again. “Tell you what, Dean: you make some progress on the wood pile and ... I’ll seriously consider allowing Sam a little playtime--by himself. Deal?”

Dean knew it was the best he was going to get. He filled the wagon with a last stack of hay with a grunt. “Deal.”

Dean worked hard on the woodpile, and was rewarded to look out the window one afternoon to see Sam outside, playing on the grass. Dean stopped working and just stared for a long few minutes, at the wonderful sight of Sam getting to be a kid for once ... except that Barbara was nearby, picking weeds, and whenever Sam got up and tried to head somewhere else, she stopped him. Soon he just sat there listlessly picking at his robes.

When Dennis took Dean out to the wheat field to harvest it, Dean said, “Sitting still on the grass for a couple of hours, not allowed to get up and do anything, is not playing.”

“I assume what you’re saying is you want to play together, since you’re still a kid, too.”

Dean felt like the farthest thing from a kid these days--he had for years, particularly after arriving here--but he’d use whatever advantage he had. “Well ... yeah!”

Dennis set the scythe business-end down and leaned on the handle, looking out over the fields toward the forest. Eventually, with a sigh, he got back to work. “Sam’s been lobbying for that, too. He’s pretty much useless by mid-afternoon, anyway. There are several problems with the idea, though.”

“Like what?? You already know it’s impossible for us to escape, no matter how much we want to.”

“I assume you’ve been down to the cove and seen how rough the ocean is. The reason you’ve never seen a ship come anywhere near the shore here is because it’s rocky and treacherous for any boat, large or small. Believe me, several of my brothers and sisters attempted escape that way. We always found their bodies later. It’s like that all up and down our shore, for miles and miles.”

Dean was dismayed, because it was plain Dennis was telling the truth. He tried to keep focused on his current goal. As long as he and Sam could talk freely, maybe between the two of them, they could come up with something. He nodded reluctantly.

“There’s danger and no help or food in every direction for many more miles than all the food and water you could carry would last you. I hope your journey here convinced you of that.” Dennis looked at him, pleased at the defeated stillness that had overtaken Dean. He smiled. “But ... Sam’s jewelry must remain whole and unbroken, and I know how young boys like to roughhouse.”

“Sam’s not much for that. I mean, we’ve had our moments ... but he’s a nerd at heart.”

“We can only produce wool and leather here, certainly not silk or cotton. Sam’s robes are priceless and must remain pristine. For you even to get close to him would probably get him covered with filth.”

Dean rolled his eyes. “I’ll clean up first, like before, when you finally let us see each other.”

“Really?” Dennis pressed heavily. “I could trust you to?”

“Of course! You think I like going around covered in sheep shit all the time??”

Dennis contemplated. He showed Dean how to swing the scythe, urging him to practice by himself on the hay in another field they were also going to have to cut later on, when the grass had grown taller. “Dean, I simply can’t allow his robes to be destroyed, and I know they would be.”

“So let him wear something else! Can’t he wear something else, just for a few hours a day?”

Dennis thought. “It would have to be white and pure.”

“The sheep are white!”

Dennis actually brightened. Dean was sure it wasn’t because he wanted to fulfill Dean’s wish, but maybe he really did want to fulfill Sam’s. “True. Well, then ... would you be willing to make him some sort of white robe he could wear while you played?”

“Yes! Yes, of course! Only ... I don’t know how.”

“I can teach you. You’ll need warmer clothes than that for yourself if you’re to keep working outside this winter, anyway.”

Dennis showed Dean the spinning wheel, the loom, the knitting machine, the treadle sewing machine. Thank God there was already some knit cloth that Dennis said he could use to make Sam’s new robes ... only the second Dean made the first cut, Dennis was so dissatisfied with his “carelessness” and “overconfidence” that he just did it himself, making Dean watch. “You don’t have time to do this kind of thing right now, I know,” Dennis said as he sewed, concentrating. “But come winter, when the garden is finished, you will. Make as much fabric as you can.”

Dean watched what Dennis was doing closely. His jeans were getting shorter and shorter as he grew. Anyway, they were wearing out from all the rough work he’d been doing. Dennis could not have made anything clearer than that if Dean wanted something, he was going to have to provide it for himself. He’d already learned how to make and preserve food of all kinds. It was time to learn how to make things out of cloth, too--a bed, for one. He’d seen a description in one of the old books he used for reference about making a tick to sleep on out of cloth stuffed with straw or some other kind of material with some loft. That sure would be a step up from sleeping on a stack of burlap sacks that barely protected him from the chill of the floor, much less how hard it was. But for now, all that mattered was getting Sam a robe to play in.

“Nice dress,” Dean teased as Sam emerged in mid-afternoon in the thing Dennis had made him.

“It’s a tunic,” Dennis snapped. “A respectable garment for men for millenia. Don’t let your ignorant brother take away from the pleasure of getting new clothes, Sam,” Dennis urged him as he carefully put hand-knit wool socks over Sam’s ... he had jewelry on his feet, too?? Just like his hands, there was a ring around his longest toe, that was connected to an anklet by a gold chain. Forget breaking the chain; if it didn’t snap quickly enough, if he caught it on something, it could break Sam’s foot. They really were going to have to be careful.

“It’s okay,” Sam chirped.

“I suppose you’re used to it,” Dennis said sardonically, putting Sam’s shoes on him over the socks. “All right. Come on, I want to show you boys something,” Dennis said.

He led them through the door that had heretofore remained barred to Dean. He looked around in wonder, but all that was visible from here was another long, wide hallway caved in on one end. Dennis led them to a winding stone staircase. As Dean looked out one of the holes in the stone wall that served as windows, he realized where they must be--the tower!

They must have already gone up more than two stories when Sam told Dean excitedly, “That’s my room!” He pointed into a room they passed, that was protected in the center of the tower, the staircase circling it. Dean caught a glimpse of a large round room with stone walls and ... thick decorative rugs? And a large bed covered with what appeared to be silk bedding?? Like he would imagine belonged to a prince.

He was about to ask Sam more about it when Dennis impatiently told them to hurry it up, and they followed him to the top of the tower.

“A bell tower!” Sam said excitedly when they emerged into the open air at the top. “But where’s the bell?”

“Long gone, I’m afraid,” Dennis said. “Probably taken by thieves. The fools probably just melted it down, but I’m sure it’d have been worth a fortune whole. Anyway, this is the highest point for a hundred miles.” He gestured out at the amazing view. “What do you see?”

“The ocean!” Sam replied eagerly, but Dean now knew why they were there, and exactly what Dennis wanted Dean to see. Whatever excitement Dean had to get to come up here and see this undeniably remarkable sight vanished.

“Yes,” Dennis said approvingly. “It looks pretty rough, doesn’t it? Do you see the way it’s crashing against the rocks and cliffs right there? Many boats have been turned into tinder, trying to traverse these waters. There’s a little cove down there where the water is calm, and a fishing boat, in case you’d like to fish, but if you took it out of the cove into the open ocean, you would surely die.”

Dean stared straight ahead, resigned. Of course. Dennis glanced at Dean’s face and seemed satisfied with what he saw. Dennis took them to the other side of the bell tower. “And what do you see out here?”

“Nothing,” Dean said, interrupting whatever Sam was about to say. May as well cut to the chase. “There’s nothing, no towns, no roads.”

“Yes, only overgrown dirt paths for miles and miles leading to this place. And no neighbors. Once upon a time, when I was a child, there were a few neighbors, but they’ve all gone away to greener pastures, it seems. We raided their houses for anything we might be able to salvage and utilize, every neighbor we remembered being here from our youth, and to a one, every house was long abandoned.” Dennis pointed to a hilly ridge, the last bit of land visible to the west. “Do you see that mountain range there?”

Dean scoffed. “Those aren’t mountains. Those are barely hills. If you’ve seen the Rockies, then you know what mountains actually look like.” He might get a beating for his insolence later, but Dennis obviously wasn’t going to do anything in front of Sam.

Dennis hid his irritation well. “Hills, then. I can tell you, they feel like mountains when you’re climbing them! Do you know what’s beyond them?”

Dean just looked at him coolly, expectantly.

“A long stretch of land, and then another range of--hills. And after that, another, and another. Sam, can you guess how many long stretches of land divided by tall ridges there are before you come to the nearest town?”

“Um ... ten?”

“Eighteen, if you can believe it. Many, many, many miles.”

Dean rolled his eyes. Dennis even saw it, and yet still seemed satisfied that Dean had absorbed his intention.

“Oh, and I want you boys to be careful when you’re out playing. There are bears in the woods, along with cougars. Try to stay in the open areas near the abbey. They prefer to keep to the forest; they’re not ocean creatures.”

“Except that bears can swim,” Sam told Dennis, proud to know this.

“Is that so?” Dennis said, acting charmed. “But I bet they swim rivers, huh, rather than oceans?”

“Probably,” Sam admitted.

“Very good. All right, then, boys, have fun. Be careful. And Sam, keep your tunic clean.”

Dean almost volunteered that it was all right, he didn’t mind washing it, when Dennis’s look stilled him. Sam ... Sam must not know Dean did the washing too, along with everything else.

Hardly one to just believe Dennis when he said there were no people and no towns around, Dean ventured very far into the forest while ‘hunting,’ systematically exploring each quadrant ... only to find everything Dennis said was true. There were the remains of various houses and outbuildings a few miles from the abbey, all obviously abandoned, and looted by Dennis and Barbara, unless someone else got to them first. Briefly, Dean considered using one as some kind of escape base for him and Sam, but clearly, these were the first places Dennis and Barbara would look if Dean and Sam disappeared.

Dennis came upon Dean when Dean was about to slaughter a pig. “Wait a minute--you just let all the blood go into the ground??” Dennis demanded. Dean froze. What the hell else was he supposed to do? “What a waste,” Dennis hissed.

“Well, what--is it good for?”

“What isn’t it good for?? Blood soup is delicious! And so nutritious. Blood pudding, blood stew ... it’s just a great thickener for sauces. You can feed it to the pigs.”

“But this is ... pigs’ blood.”

“They’ll love it.” Dean turned his face away to hide his disgust. Of course Dennis was all for cannibalism. “At the very least, pour it on the garden! It’s good for that, too. Anything except letting it run into the ground to attract bears. We use every part of the animal, Dean. Every part. Here.” He got out a trough for Dean to let the blood drain into. “I better not see you letting any other food go to waste. Everything can be used. Even if it’s rotten, compost it. But pigs will eat anything. And make a country ham out of one of those legs. I haven’t had country ham in ages.”

“What’s that?”

“Pig leg, preserved with salt and sugar and spices.”

“Oh yeah, by the way, you need to buy more salt. We’re running low.”

“‘Buy’?” Dennis repeated merrily.

“Um, yeah. All that canning really cut into the supply.”

“My God, every time I think there might be a brain in there, you pop out with something like this.”

“What! It’s not like you can make it!”

“Ever hear of the ocean, Dean?” Dennis sneered. “Turns out it’s full of salt!”

“But--how--”

“In all your time lazing about in the fishing boat, you never noticed the cauldron over the firepit?”

“I figured it was for cooking fish stew!”

“No. It’s only for making salt. Start a fire, fill it with ocean water, and let it boil down until there’s nothing left but salt.”

“But that’ll take hours!”

“Yes, so it’d be best if you got the fire started first thing in the morning and just went back down there to add wood throughout the day while you tend to your other duties. Try not to scorch it.” Dean stared as Dennis stalked back to the abbey.

Dean set the trough where it would catch most of the blood, trying to get back in the frame of mind to kill this squealing pig, now that he also had to listen to its blood hitting the metal for however long it took to drain out of it. Make salt? And a country ham too?? What the hell was that? He’d be poring over those old cookbooks all afternoon again.

It was a good thing he did, because he discovered all kinds of ways to preserve meat in addition to the country ham method; before now, he’d desperately tried to use up all the meat before it went bad. The root cellar was as cold as a refrigerator, so it took a few days, but it was always a close call. Now he didn’t have to worry about a beating if he didn’t manage to use it all while it was still fresh.

It was a good thing he was learning to make clothes, too, because already, it was getting damn cold at night. He saved and tanned the skins of all the animals he slaughtered, and screw Dennis; before he let him have any of them, he was going to make everything he could think of for himself. He made the tick out of sheepskin rugs, and actually, though he had to replace the straw now and then, it was both soft and warm. He made himself fur hats, scarves, a cloak he labored for weeks on, and finally, a fur blanket. Dennis never said anything about him taking all the skins for himself, though he seemed pleased when Dean finally gave him a few, out of things to make for himself, and hopeful he’d make something new for Sam. He needed everything he’d made just to keep from going numb with cold after he got up from his nice warm bed in the morning to light a fire in the wood stove to start breakfast.

He found he had to figure out how to use the knitting machine, though, when he went down to the beach to make salt again and discovered the animal skins didn’t keep him warm at all once they got wet. One of the books he used for reference claimed wool was nearly as warm wet as when dry, and as light. Dean had noticed Dennis had started going around in knit wool leggings. It looked ridiculous--the guy was basically wearing tights. With a sigh, Dean realized he was going to have to go around in tights, too.

Dennis gave him an old, wind-up alarm clock so he could be sure to get up in time to make breakfast, which was vital once the days got short and he had to get up before dawn. He was glad to have the tights as he carefully made his way down the cliffside by lanternlight to build the fire under the cauldron as the dawn slowly bloomed over the ocean. If he had time, he just sat there warming himself by the fire there in the cove, sheltered from the wind, watching the sun rise.

It was ... peaceful. Now that he knew his duties and did them without complaint, Dennis didn’t bother him anymore, didn’t even usually make fun of him. Dennis was right that there wasn’t that much to do in the winter. Dean spent long hours knitting wool for more pairs of tights--double-knit this time, even triple knit, to really keep out the cold. He made some for Sam, too, so they might be able to venture outside sometimes during playtime. The animals were calm, a reassuring presence, sometimes even cuddling up against Dean when he just sat for hours in the barn, thinking.

There really was no escape. No matter how he looked at it, he couldn’t see a way. He and Sam had spent many afternoons brainstorming ideas. After Sam found out Dean had made Sam’s new wool tights himself, he thought Dean should weave a huge ‘HELP’ sign and hang it down the cliff face. It was a good idea, the best either of them had had yet, except Dennis would undoubtedly soon find it, tear it down, throw it away, and beat Dean, if he didn’t finally kill him for it.

“I’ll show you how to shear a sheep,” Dennis told Dean, as the weather was beginning at last to get warm again. Warm again. Had they really been here almost a year already? “Then you’ll have some more wool to work with. It’s not that hard. I know they’re a pain in the ass to milk--”

“They’re a pain in the ass in general,” Dean agreed.

“Yes, but delicious and fleecy, they give milk ... and this particular flock was free, so sheep it is. Anyway, once you get one on its back, it becomes helpless.” He smiled to himself. Dean didn’t get the joke.

Dean watched as Dennis sheared one expertly. “Try to be very careful with the shears. Unfortunately, you will cut one sometimes. It causes them to suffer if their fleece is never sheared, from excessive heat and weight, so remember that one way or another, it must be done, and now, before it gets too hot. Just do your best. Now you try.”

Dean couldn’t even wrestle the first one to the ground. Dennis unceremoniously dumped the thing onto its back for him. “Don’t feel sorry for them; just do what has to be done.” As Dean started making his first cuts with the long scissor-looking shears, Dennis went on, looking pleased with himself, “Words to live by.”

As he watched Dean struggle to get the second one onto its back, too, not helping this time, Dennis said, “Dean, if this is really the kind of pussy you are, you may as well throw yourself off the cliff right now; you’ll never make it.”

“Plenty of people aren’t as mean as you, and they get by,” Dean grunted, finally getting the sheep into position.

“Civilians, maybe. Not hunters.”

“I’ve met a ton of hunters. Still none as mean as you.”

“Ooh, mean ol’ Dennis,” Dennis mocked, “doing what needs to be done.”

“You don’t ‘need’ to threaten to kill me every five minutes.”

“Of course a selfish little creep like you would see it that way, but the fact is, Dean, maybe you don’t ‘need’ to exist, any more than that sheep you’re shearing. We ate one of her lambs last week.”

Why did Dennis have to put it like that?? The sick freak managed to turn the most harmless activities macabre. Dean flinched when Dennis, observing him start shearing this one, said, “Good.” Somehow even a positive word from this guy felt creepy. “You do pick things up pretty quickly. Keep that up, and you’ll prove you’re worth keeping around.”

“Gee, thanks.”

Dean worked in silence as Dennis watched. “The fleece looks like shit,” Dennis remarked. “It’s not even fit to be spun, the way you’re shearing it. But it’s still useful; you can line a jacket with it, a quilt--anything. Don’t waste it. Eventually, after some practice, you’ll get some halfway decent fleeces to work with. In the meantime, spin the ones I gave you last summer.”

Tired of just watching, Dennis got up and started collecting eggs. “I know you think I’m the meanest person who ever lived, but someday, Dean, you’ll realize I’m actually very nice.”

Dean managed to hold in his guffaw.

“I admit, the way I grew up made me have to be harder than many. I suppose you’re right about that. One of the names out there in the forest, Jason ... he was one of my favorite brothers. He was only twelve. He was mortally wounded and in agony. He begged me to kill him, not make him have to suffer like that for the hours or days it would take him to die of his wounds, and once I fulfilled his wish ... I knew there was nothing I couldn’t do.”

Jesus. Dean had stopped working, stopped moving, scarcely able to breathe. This guy had killed his brother? No wonder he was so twisted.

“I know you think I’m evil, but to believe that, you must never have seen true evil. The priest was evil, and many of the nuns. I’ll spare you the details of all the countless ways they tortured us ... but you know, there’s a reason whips hang from walls in the hallway by the dining room.”

“Did they ever get caught?”

“‘Caught’--oh, you mean by the authorities? No; it was the fifties; guardians of children could get away with anything, doubly so if they were of the cloth. No, no. We slaughtered them.”

Dean stood up straight. The sheep he’d been shearing jumped to its feet and ran off, bleating outraged. “What?!”

“If you push a person far enough, it’s inevitable,” Dennis said, like this was the most normal, everyday conversation. “We were all good kids--disturbingly good and well-behaved; nothing like you. But there came a day ... I woke up that morning believing it would be a day like any other, but when we were all gathered together for mealtime, one child revolted and was beaten brutally, as any rebel always was. As happened all too often, the priest went overboard. You’ve never seen such rage as was in that man. He was killing him. He knew it. He didn’t stop. We’d all seen it before, and we just ... couldn’t take it anymore. As one, we went nuts. We killed the priest--quite brutally, blood and body parts everywhere, and then we got a couple of nuns. The rest barred themselves in the chapel, but we found our way in, and slaughtered them to the last one. It’s a shame, really; some of them were kind, and did what they could to protect us. But once it began, it was bound to end thus.”

“Holy shit.” No wonder half of them killed themselves, knowing they were murderers several times over. Not Dennis and Barbara, though. “Then what happened?”

“Then we fed the bodies to the pigs and went to the most sympathetic neighbors for help, who had some inkling what went on here all those years they lived nearby, children disappearing, never to be heard from again, and the like. They covered for us and got us out, the younger ones to better places, the rest of us out on our own, me and Barbara among the latter. That’s partly why we were pretty sure we would be able to return here, when we thought up the idea, a few years ago. We were virtually certain none of our brothers and sisters would ever want to come back here. We didn’t want to, either, but it was exactly what we were looking for: someplace private, untouched, a place no one would ever find. That’s what appealed to the priest, as well. A place where we could live off the land. We were right that no one seemed to have lived here in all the intervening years--in fact, it was quite haunted. Barbara and I found the remains and burned them, got rid of all the ghosts.” He smirked. “It was a shock, seeing some of those faces again! But once we did that ... it hasn’t been so bad to be back here. It’s kind of nice.”

Dennis sat there, pressing his hands together, the strangest smile on his face. He did this sometimes. Now Dean knew what he must be thinking about. He’d said it was hard to live with the memories. He’d never be able to escape them. At last, Dennis seemed to return to the present and got up. He rubbed his hands together as he headed back up to the abbey. “Mmm, mutton.”

Well, that wasn’t a story you heard every day. Why did Dennis even tell him that? Wasn’t that the kind of thing you took to your grave? Even if he did decide to tell someone, why Dean? Dennis was chummy like that. It seemed like there was nothing he wouldn’t wax on to Dean about--Dean, whom he knew very well hated his guts.

Had Dennis developed some fondness for Dean after living and working together all this time? That was natural, wasn’t it? Grudgingly, Dean had developed a little sympathy for Dennis and all he’d been through in his life. You just couldn’t help it, if you were human. Dean tried to take it to mean that Dennis was warming to him, at least a bit, only it didn’t feel like that. It felt like ... the opposite.

It was one night, on the very edge of sleep, that it suddenly hit him: A dead man couldn’t tell your secrets. There was absolutely nothing Dennis wouldn’t tell Dean, no secret he wouldn’t unburden himself about with him, because he had decided long ago that, sooner or later, he was going to kill Dean.

Maybe it would be when Dean got strong and big enough to finally beat him in a fight. Maybe he had some date in mind, to do with how they intended to manipulate Sam or when they feared they might make their move to escape. Maybe he was always itching to do it, if Dean didn’t prove himself useful enough. Maybe he simply fully assumed that one day he would go overboard while he was beating him, as apparently happened to many of his brothers and sisters. If there was any way out of here ... they had to do it soon.

Very soon. The next day, running outside to play now that the weather was finally getting warm again, Sam only made it halfway down the hill before suddenly, inexplicably becoming so winded he had to sit down. Dean stared, bewildered, asking Sam if he was sick. Sam just shook his head, and the way he wouldn’t look Dean in the eye ... Sam knew what it was that had rendered him so weak. It was something those freaks were doing to him, but he insisted it was nothing and he was fine, and tried all afternoon to hide how hard his body quivered any time he tried to exert himself.

Dennis had said they got into the chapel when the nuns barricaded themselves in there, which meant there must be a way. Dean had looked at this abbey from every angle, inside and out, in every part he could get to. Every wall was made of stone, feet thick. The doors were the thickest, hardest wood Dean had ever seen--Dennis had shown him scratches in the door into the kitchen made by a bear, and they’d hardly left a dent. He’d have to hack at any door in here with an axe for days before he’d even begin to break through, and they didn’t have days when they were coming for the nuns. The caved-in parts were untraversable. They locked themselves and Sam behind multiple sets of doors in the parts of the building still standing, anyway. He just couldn’t figure it out ... until one night when he lay on his makeshift bed in the hallway before he doused the lantern, and gazing upward ... he saw the rafters.

The rafters! Across most of the building, they were so high up, you usually couldn’t even see them, lost in the murky darkness where no sunlight reached--two, even three stories up. But in the kitchen, and anywhere near the north and south outside walls the roof descended toward, the high-up rafters were joined to lower ones by others affixed at a slant--at an angle Dean could navigate. The rafters still stood, even where the walls had fallen. Even where the walls were whole, there was always a little gap just above each rafter, big enough for a kid to get through.

The very next morning, the second he heard the bar slot in place into the forbidden area, Dean ran for his tallest ladder and put it against the rafter he’d chosen after scouting around before breakfast. He couldn’t tell for sure, but he had reason to believe this might lead him directly into the chapel, or if not, he wouldn’t have far to go on a connecting rafter to get to one that would.

Shimmying up the angled rafter into the upper reaches of the abbey, trying to ignore the spiders and bats flying away as he came upon their daytime sleeping spots and the dust that surely must have sat atop these rafters undisturbed since a group of kids used them to gain access to the hiding place of their captors forty-some years ago, he felt only excitement to reach the upper level ... until he looked down and instantly got dizzy. He had to cling to the rafter as hard as he could with arms and legs both lest he fall--a fall that would either maim or kill him. This was a bad plan. But ... the only one. Whatever they were doing to Sam, he had to know.

Just don’t look down. He scooted across the top of the fortunately wide, sturdy rafter, going faster as he started to hear voices. He crossed a section of wall and was suddenly nearly blinded by daylight. The chapel! He was right that this rafter would get him all the way there. He could see the very top of the wall of stained-glass windows. He crawled forward, desperately eager. Dennis and Barbara were talking. Dean heard a little clanking and footsteps from inside the chapel. He was almost there.

He crossed the final wall--crumbled much more than he’d been led to believe, given how much Dennis waxed on about the miracle of the stained glass having withstood what so much stone couldn’t. A whole two-thirds of one end of the inner wall of the chapel was rubble, though indeed, most of the rest of it was intact. No wonder they locked Dean out of multiple sets of doors between the dining room and here--he would be able to hear them if he was any closer.

Dean looked down, his fervor to see Sam overcoming the instinctive terror of the danger of precariously perching at such a height. Dean was pretty far away, so high up, but he had a birds-eye view ... of Sam, spread-eagled on the floor, in the middle of an enormous circle with runes written all around it. A pentagram, actually, and Sam’s four limbs and his head were each at one of the five points. They made him lie there on the cold floor?? But then he saw the blankets beneath him. Well, at least there was that.

Still, Sam just ... did it, just laid himself out there for them like a sacrificial lamb? It was terrible to see his pale face, eyes closed, just ... resigned to having to submit to all this. Then Dean saw what the chains around his neck, wrists, and ankles were really for: he was chained to the floor.

Dean forced himself to hold in his gasp of rage. What they were doing to his little brother! Was this what they had done all along?? Had Sam had to come in here every day and simply lie there while they did whatever they wanted to him? What were they doing?

Dean peered closely. Mostly they were walking around. Barbara was lighting a ton of candles positioned around the circle. There were flowers and herbs in bowls within easy reach, and some other kind of dark-brown substance he couldn’t identify--it looked like witchcraft to Dean. Dennis was paging through some ancient-looking book. He started reading an incantation, and then ... then Barbara bent over a bowl next to Sam’s arm, where ....

Dean couldn’t stop himself from letting out a sound. Blood! It was Sam’s blood in the bowl! Barbara stroked Sam’s cheek, thanked him, and told him he was doing a great job, removing a needle from his arm and taking the bowl away to place on the altar. It was all Dean could do to hold in a scream.

At Dean’s sound, Sam’s eyes opened. He peered curiously, confused, into the rafters, and as his eyes settled on Dean, they got huge. His mouth fell open.

“What is it, Sam?” said Barbara, noticing.

When Sam didn’t answer, Barbara and Dennis started looking up, too. Dean tried to make himself as small as he could up there, but he was bathed in the morning light coming through the wall of windows. Shit!

Suddenly, Sam cried out. “Sam, what’s wrong?” Barbara asked solicitously. Dean dared to peer over the edge again, only to realize Sam had thought fast to get their attention off the rafters. Both Barbara and Dennis’s attention was entirely focused on him now. “Sam, what’s the matter?”

As Dean carefully made his way back to the ladder, he seethed with rage. Dennis and Barbara were going to die. They could barricade themselves in any room in the place, and Dean would come for them. Nothing could stop him.

“Please don’t watch,” Sam whispered, soft as a breath. “Dean ... I can handle everything else they do--it makes me tired, but I can take it, but I just can’t take ... for you to ... see me like that.”

Dean thought back to what it felt like when Dennis was beating him in the courtyard, fearing Sam could see from the windows. He’d felt exactly like that: like he could take the beating, and whatever else Dennis dished out, he just couldn’t bear the thought that Sam had seen him humiliated like that. Now he knew surely he hadn’t, chained to the floor as he was, and anyway, Dean had seen while he was in the rafters that the windows started much higher up the wall than Sam could reach to see. The relief he felt when he realized Sam definitely hadn’t seen it ... although he couldn’t imagine why Sam would feel shame over something he had no control over, still, he understood what he was saying. Dennis once said the worst part about the punishments the orphans had to endure was that his brothers and sisters all had to watch. Dean got it.

“But I had to see, Sam, don’t you get it?? You should’ve told me!”

“So that what? So you’d feel helpless, too? Except that you wouldn’t! You’d have attacked Dennis and Barbara, and I’m so afraid of what they’d do to you! It would only make you feel bad--it did only make you feel bad!--but there’s no solution.”

“So, what, then, Sam? Because this can’t go on.”

“Well ... are you okay?”

Dean shrugged. He was okay. There were ways to escape Dennis’s wrath. Dennis was pretty predictable, actually. And the work ... sometimes he enjoyed it. “Yeah. I’m okay.”

“Then I’m okay. I know they won’t kill me, Dean. They need me alive. I can take it. But I can’t take you ... worrying about me.”

Dean scoffed. “Like I could not!”

“That’s why I didn’t tell you, Dean!” His voice was high, keening. He was still just a child. Just a little child, being put through all this. Any shred of belief Dean had ever had in the concept of God vanished when he saw He would allow something like this to happen to a little kid. How could Dennis believe? “I couldn’t stand for you to know! I hate that you know now. It was so much better when you thought it was just weird rituals.”

“I knew it wasn’t just that, though.”

Sam looked up at him, surprised. “How?”

“I could feel it. From the very beginning, I knew.”

Sam looked down. “It’s still worse now, though,” he whispered.

“It can’t go on like this,” Dean repeated. “We have to do something.”

“No. Not yet. Bobby’s still looking for us, I’m sure--”

“Dennis is right. He’ll never find us.”

“--Or maybe someone else will come someday to visit, and we can tell them what they’re doing to us.”

“They’re completely self-sufficient, though. They even make their own salt! Their own pails! I haven’t seen anything new since we got here. And they don’t have a car. I checked. No one will ever come. They never tell people about this place or how to get here. They don’t want anyone to find out what they’re doing here to kids they kidnapped.”

“Dean ... someday ... something will change. It has to.”

Dean looked at Sam, sitting there on the grass of the meadow, looking out toward the lowering sun, pale and thin, old beyond his years. He always was, but now he was even much more beyond his years than ever, like a little old man. At least they were still alive. And they had each other. If Dean gave into his most fervent desires and attacked Dennis and Barbara ... he would almost certainly fail, and they would kill him, and little Sam, perpetually weakened, would be left all alone in their clutches forever. Sam was right that, now anyway, there was nothing else they could do.

“It better,” said Dean.

Dean slammed the bowl of brownish, viscous liquid down on the lunch table. “Here you go, just like you kept requesting: blood soup.” Dennis’s face lit up and he reached for the ladle. “Sam doesn’t have to eat any, though.” Nor did Dean intend to, of course.

Dennis pulled his hand back. He didn’t seem to be getting Dean’s hint about him being a blood-draining monster; he took another meaning from it. “Well, but Sam has to have at least a little, doesn’t he?” Dennis said, ladling a bit into a bowl and setting it in front of Sam. Dennis had grown lax as weeks turned to months and Dean hadn’t tried to poison him, but he never missed a warning sign, never once.

As if all he had energy for was moving a utensil from plate to mouth, Sam silently dipped in his spoon and brought it to his mouth. Dean recoiled. Ugh, poor Sam, having to eat that disgusting stuff. Cooking it up turned Dean’s stomach, even if Dennis was surely right that it was full of protein and other nutrients, and they had plenty of it every time they slaughtered an animal. Sam didn’t flinch, though; either he was too worn out to think much about it, or ... no, it was because he trusted Dean’s cooking that much. Dean didn’t fix it for him, though! He made it as a punishment for Dennis! He barely even seasoned it.

Dean watched closely as Sam took his first bite, but Dennis was watching Dean. Seeming satisfied when Dean didn’t knock the spoon out of Sam’s hand or fess up to having included something he shouldn’t have in the soup, Dennis happily ladled himself out a big bowlful, Barbara following suit. “Finally!” Dennis said, digging in.

Dean only had eyes for Sam, though, as after the first bite, he took a second, much bigger one, then a third. Noticing this, Dennis filled his bowl to the brim, and Sam ate every bite. Of course he did, Dean realized. He must be so anemic, and the soup must be full of iron and whatever else he was desperately lacking.

Dean slumped down in his chair and put his head in his hands. He could never get a lick in that didn’t come back and hit him instead. At times like this, it was hard not to lose all hope.

Once Dean figured out how to get into the forbidden areas, he set up rope ladders in the kitchen and the most convenient place on the other side of the always barred door, pulling that one up behind him when he was done with it before Dennis and Barbara got up. During the day, when the kitchen rope had to be hidden, he stuffed it atop the rafter with a broom, and got it down at night with the same broom after they all went to bed.

He finally got to see Sam’s room. He didn’t have even one window. Otherwise, it really was fit for royalty: white-and-gold silk sheets with blue silk edges, thick warm carpets over the stone floor, tapestries on the wall. Still, Sam didn’t like to be in there. They screwed around to their hearts’ content the first few nights they finally got to be together without any kind of surveillance, exploring the whole abbey. When they got too tired to stay awake any longer, Sam couldn’t bear to be locked in his room again, where Dean barred the door from the outside before dawn, just as he found it, suggesting they sleep in ‘Dean’s bed.’ It could be done without great danger, since Dean had that alarm clock to make sure he got Sam back to his room in time, but that wasn’t the problem; it was that he didn’t want Sam to see where he slept.

When Sam insisted, he looked around curiously at everything: the burlap sacks he still kept under the straw tick for added insulation, the fur rugs and blankets, the few objects Dean liked to keep there, the way that part of the hallway was carefully swept. “They make you sleep here?” he asked at last, perplexed.

“Well ... they let me sleep here. I passed out here the first night, and it’s out of the way, so ....”

Sam sat on Dean’s bed and looked up at him. “Why are they so ... mean to you?” He looked sad.

“Good fucking question,” Dean growled, sitting next to him.

Sam touched a bruise on Dean’s arm. Dean pulled his sleeve lower so he couldn’t see it, but he could feel that Sam knew, just like that. Just seeing that and where Dean slept told him everything. “Really mean,” Sam whispered.

Dean shrugged and lay back, his hands behind his head. Sam lay back, too, imitating his pose. He’d always done that. “So they make you do all the cooking, and ... what else?”

There was no point trying to hide it from him anymore. “Everything,” Dean said shortly. “It’s like I’m Cinderella,” he grumbled.

“It really is. So what does that make me? One of your wicked step-sisters, wearing silk robes, bathing in all the water you fetch, eating all the food you make?” Sam asked glumly.

“No! It’s not like you like all that crap! No, you’re--Rapunzel! Locked in that tower ....”

“But I don’t have any hair.” His eyes grew wet. Dean had known that must be killing him.

“Well, I don’t have a fairy godmother or cool shoes, either.”

“Your shoes are pretty cool,” Sam insisted.

Dean held them up for him to see, turning his foot so Sam could look from multiple angles, glad that he didn’t have to keep any secrets anymore about this place or all he had to do here. “I made them myself,” Dean told him proudly.

“I want some!”

“I’ll make you some,” Dean assured him.

He did--better ones even than his own, now that he knew what he was doing as he drilled the holes in the wooden sole--Dean had had to redrill some of his own when he’d drilled them too close to the edge and they’d broken through. Also, he made Sam’s boots out of pure white snowhare fur, in hopes maybe Dennis and Barbara might let him wear them outside so they could play out there even when it was cold.

“There’s two good things about this place,” Dean told Sam as he led him up the tower steps to the belltower one night after Dennis and Barbara went to bed. He looked back when he didn’t hear Sam’s footsteps right behind him, to see him lagging behind. He was so pale, and so winded. Dean went back and simply picked him up. It was just easier. Besides, Dean was really strong these days; probably all the wood chopping, and Sam by contrast now weighed virtually nothing.

“All the bacon and jam and jelly and pie you can eat, and ... this.” Dean set Sam down, opened the hatch to the belltower, and let Sam climb that part himself. Dean pointed up to the sky, which was so dark and clear, you could see a million stars at least.

Sam gasped as he saw a shooting star, pointing. “Yep. There’s been a ton of ’em lately. That’s what I brought you up here for. Make a wish. Make a lot of ’em. I know I’m gonna.”

Sheltered by the low walls of the belltower from the spring wind that blew perpetually off the ocean, wrapped in the fur blanket Dean brought along, they were comfortable enough, lying on their backs looking up at the sky. With each starfall, Dean made another wish, but they all seemed to come back to Sam: Heal Sam. Make him strong again. Make him okay.

Dean woke to something he hadn’t in almost a year: sunlight on his face. It was pleasant. As the meaning of it came to him, he sat up with a start. They’d fallen asleep! Dennis and Barbara might already be up!

Not even bothering to wake him, Dean picked up Sam and carried him down the tower stairs into his room, where he barely remembered to grab the blanket before rushing out, barring the door, and fleeing to the rope ladder. He’d barely gotten to the top and pulled it up after him when he heard Barbara and Dennis emerge from wherever they slept at night, chatting cheerily. Dean froze as Dennis came straight to the kitchen calling for him, scarcely even daring to breathe. One glance upward and it was all over.

When he didn’t immediately find him, Dennis got frantic. Dean discovered Dennis did indeed know where Dean slept, as that was the first place he looked for him, before booking it outside, all of which Dean could see from this high vantage. Dennis couldn’t have developed some sort of affection for Dean over the year he served him, could he? Hearing him muttering about how he would beat him so viciously he wouldn’t be able to sit for a week if he’d tried to run away, Dean realized of course it wasn’t that. He was just afraid Dean had made some sort of escape attempt.

Dennis ran out to check the garden. Dean scarcely had time to jump down into the kitchen and throw the rope back up before Dennis came flying in again, his face a dark mask of fury. Dennis looked bewildered but relieved to see Dean there. “Where were you?” he asked, confused.

“Using, uh ... my ‘chamber pot.’”

“Oh.” His explanation didn’t seem to add up to Dennis, but Dennis was so relieved he wasn’t missing, he just smiled. “Okay. Please make a good breakfast today. I’m craving eggs--lots of runny eggs, sunny-side up.”

“Gotcha.”

Dean turned and immediately went down to the chicken coop, trying to regain his composure after that close call. How could he have fallen asleep?? Of course Sam did; he slept like the dead these days, but Dean was appalled at himself. Why didn’t he at least bring the alarm clock?? They’d been up there many nights, and he’d never fallen asleep before. It was the cold, he realized. Last night was almost balmy, the air no colder than in the hallway where he slept. He’d definitely have to remember the alarm clock from now on.

He spent extra long in the chicken coop, trying to pull himself together, made harder by how tired he was. He and Sam had stayed up for hours, talking and making wishes. Sam hadn’t even woken up when Dean put him back in his bed. Had Dean forgotten anything in his room in his rush to get back to places he was allowed to be? He couldn’t remember.

Still, all seemed normal over breakfast, Dennis slurping up those half-raw eggs like the freak he was. Even Sam liked them. Dean cast off his fears as he went out to the garden to start doing some early planting.

Mid-morning, Dennis came into the courtyard. “Dean, could you come with me, please?” Dennis grabbed a hoe as he led them back into the abbey.

Dean laid down the shovel and followed him, astonished when Dennis led him past the door that had always remained barred to Dean before this moment, except that time he took them up to the belltower. Had--had Dennis finally decided he trusted him enough to let him into more parts of the abbey than the little corner he’d been relegated to all this time?

Of course it wasn’t that. Why had he thought that? Lifting the hoe up to the top of the rafter, Dennis rummaged around with it as Dean stared in horror. Presently, the rope ladder fell down. Dennis looked at Dean expectantly.

“I’ve--never seen that before. I guess it must have been from someone else who lived here.”

Dennis gripped it, yanked on it. “Yet it’s new rope. Brand-new.”

“Well, I don’t know what to tell ya. Maybe someone was living here right before you guys got back.”

“You aren’t the worst liar I’ve ever seen, Dean, but not great. I’d been noticing things here and there--Sam’s feet and hems dirty first thing in the morning, him positioned strangely in his bed this morning ... all kinds of things. But only when you were nowhere to be found today did I begin to piece it all together.”

“You gave me the idea. I figured out how you kids must have gotten into the chapel when the nuns hid in there.” There was no sense hiding it anymore. Dennis was already convinced. Any ongoing attempts to lie would only enrage him further. The beating was inevitable.

Dean eyed the hoe still in Dennis’s hand nervously. If he could just disarm him ... actually, if he could get it himself, he could really do some damage. He’d never won a fight against Dennis, not once, yet he couldn’t allow that to make him give up hope. With every new day, he was a tiny bit bigger and stronger than before. Besides, he couldn’t help analyzing each of their scuffles afterward and figuring out what he could have done better. One day ... one day, he had to win. He had to, because if he didn’t, one day, Dennis would kill him.

Dennis smirked, also glancing at the hoe. “This? Yeah, this can kill a man. It can easily kill a child. I’m really pissed this time, Dean. You won’t ever forget this one, as long as you live. Believe me.”

Dean didn’t even have time to find a defensive position before the first blow from the handle of the hoe. He stayed as silent as he could during every beating, so as not to give Dennis the satisfaction, but he couldn’t help the sound that came out of him. Dennis had once hit him with a mop handle, but it was about half the diameter of the hoe handle. He would have broken bones at the end of this beating, he knew it.

Dean lunged for the hoe, only to be grabbed by the face by Dennis, squeezing as hard as he could, filled with rage. Dennis flung him backwards, where he hit the sideboard and went down.

He jumped to his feet as quickly as he could, because Dennis, like the sicko he was, loved to pummel you without mercy once he had you down--yet as soon as Dean was up, before he had a chance to turn to face him again, Dennis whacked him across the back with the full force of the handle like he was wielding a baseball bat. Dean heard something crack inside him. Not only did he cry out, but he couldn’t help groaning as he lay on the ground, getting his knees under him, trying to get to his feet again, not succeeding ... and then he heard Sam’s voice. He was saying, “What’s happening? What’s that sound? I thought I heard Dean.” Barbara reassured him in her creepy way.

“Quiet!” Dennis hissed, grabbing one of the whips off the wall and taking advantage of Dean’s position on his knees to go to town on his back. “You’ll have to grow back half your skin after this,” Dennis said with grim satisfaction.

Then a bunch of stuff happened that didn’t make any sense. Dean thought he heard Barbara scream, but only for a second. Dennis stopped whipping Dean, calling for her, then just kicking Dean a few times for good measure, Dean got the impression to make sure Dean would stay down while he went to investigate. Then, as Dean looked up to see that he was really walking away, trying to gather the strength to get to his feet and get that hoe before he came back, Dennis shrieked, too, and ... was suddenly gone. Just disappeared, except that his boots were still there ... and where he had been, a dark grinning cloud, with the face of a monster.

Then he heard Sam. “No! Not Dean! Don’t eat Dean!” he was screaming at the top of his lungs.

At that sound, Dean was able to scramble to his feet and run for the chapel, holding his ribs, veering around the cloud-monster, which apparently had the power to eat a human in a single bite but was holding its ground, held back by something. Dean was afraid the door would be barred, but Dennis had only pulled it to when he went to confront Dean. Dean burst through, to find Sam chained to the floor, very little of Barbara left beside him.

Sam looked over when he came in. “No, Dean, run! It’s gonna kill us next!”

Dean ran to Sam to try to unhook him from the floor.

“Dean, no, you have to run!”

“I’m gonna save us both!”

“You can’t, because it comes from inside me!” Dean looked up as a shadow came over them, and there it was, between them and the stained-glass windows, grinning hungrily. Dean managed to get the first chain unhooked, and moved on to the next, where it occurred to him to try to just break the golden chain instead, which was much thinner than the hooks. As he grabbed it, Sam cried urgently, “No! Don’t break it--it’s the only thing allowing me to control him!” Dean glanced up at the thing. It hadn’t come any closer. He went back to work, trying to unhook Sam without breaking the chains.

“Please, Dean,” Sam begged, tears rolling down his temples, “I can’t hold it back forever! You have to leave! I have to--I have to know that at least you’re okay.”

“I ain’t okay if you’re not,” Dean grunted. He was getting the hang of how these hooks worked. He managed to unhook him completely, and hauled Sam to his feet. “I can’t carry you right now. We have to run.”

“We can’t run from something that comes from me!”

The cloud demon had shimmered a couple of times, light beginning to pass through it, as Dean worked. Dean feared that meant it was gathering energy, but instead, as he took another look at it, he saw that it was farther from them now, and seemed less dark and solid than it did before. What had changed? Sam wasn’t touching the hooks now. Did the type of metal the hooks were made of somehow strengthen the monster? They still stood in the circle, though. Dean took them out of it, and the monster faded by half.

He looked around. The rituals--evidently they had finally worked. Parts of the rituals were to bring out the demon; other parts were to control it, if Sam was correct about what the chains were for. The chains, the hooks, the circle, what else? Dean saw the bowl of blood on the altar, a bowl of what looked like hair next to it--Sam’s hair.

Sam saw it at the same moment--he knocked the bowl of hair to the floor. The demon roared. “We have to take my blood somewhere where the earth can purify it,” he said, seeming to refer to things Dennis and Barbara had mentioned in his presence.

Dean grabbed the bowl of blood. The monster swiped at Dean, but somehow it didn’t quite reach him. Dean glanced down at Sam, at his lined, ashen face, the tension, the--the effort. He was controlling it. “Come on,” said Dean, and raced out of the chapel, as fast as he could go without spilling Sam’s blood.

Later, he would wonder why he hadn’t just thrown it in the ocean. That would have been easiest, right? But when Sam said a place where the earth could purify it, Dean thought of only one place: the garden. He’d already been pouring blood on it for a long time, and anyway, it was as pure a place as he knew. Glancing up one last time at Sam to see if he had any objection and seeing that Sam, at least, didn’t seem to have any better ideas, Dean poured it over the place he’d planted seeds just that morning. As he did, he saw the last hint of the shadow that had followed them out here, remaining always exactly the same distance from them, tethered to Sam, dissipate in the morning sun.

“Is it over?” Dean asked, unable to keep from falling to his knees now that they seemed to have escaped all the most immediate danger.

Sam looked around, looked over the trees, the dew on the leaves, put his hand over his own solar plexus. The birds had started cheeping again after what Dean was now beginning to realize was a strange and terrible hush when they first came out. When Dean poured out the bowl, the first few chirps here and there were hesitant. Now they were beginning to return to their usual morning clamor.

Sam nodded. “It’s gone.”

They spent most of the rest of the day passed out in Dean’s bed, dead to the world. When Dean finally woke after peaceful, happy dreams, everything that happened that morning slowly came back to him. That was all impossible, right? It had to be a dream. But seeing Sam lying there beside him, still in his silken robes, now filthy; shifting his position and feeling the pain of Dennis’s vicious beating that morning, there could be no doubt. Even just being there in his bed with Sam when the light was so low and golden told him so. He got up, making sure not to jostle Sam, trying not to groan loud enough to wake him as he struggled to get upright, more sore and throbbing than he’d ever been in his life.

The first thing he did was check on Dennis and Barbara. Were they really--was his perception accurate, that only their shoes and maybe something in them was all that was left of them? He found Dennis’s shoes in the big hallway just as he remembered them. He peeked in the chapel, afraid of seeing the monster again, but all seemed peaceful in there, fresh flowers still sitting in the pews, the picture of serenity and piety, except for the bits of human in the pentagram circle. He went outside to check on the blood in the garden, which looked just like any blood he’d ever poured on there, and no monster lurked in the shadows.

Finally, he tended the animals. It was the first thing he did upon waking every day for almost a year; he didn’t know what else to do. As the pigs rejoiced to see him, he found comfort in the routine, in the work itself, in the familiarity of all these things he knew now how to do so well. Natural things. Everything Dennis and Barbara did tried to twist what was natural to their terrible ends. They took what was pure and sought to control it until it became something dark and unnatural. They knew no other way. He was kind of bummed not to have been the one who killed them, but on the other hand, it seemed right that as Dennis found a way to turn every effort Dean made against him back on Dean, in the end it came back on him, permanently. Actually, really, it was Sam who got them. As much reason as Dean had to kill Dennis, Dean figured Sam had still more.

Slowly hauling the egg pail up to the kitchen, he saw Sam standing outside the door, just ... looking, at the world he’d been forbidden all this time. Dean’s world. They’d been separated from each other by a couple of doors and a vast gulf of experience. Somehow they were carrying on completely different lives, a few dozen yards away from each other. All these things that made up Dean’s daily life were entirely unknown to Sam. He peeked in the pail when Dean brought it in and looked up at Dean with wonder. “You did all this yourself?” he asked, awed.

“I’ve never laid an egg, Sam,” Dean teased, setting them down.

Sam picked up an egg, feeling it, amazed. “It’s still warm!”

Sam couldn’t get enough of it, of watching and helping Dean light a fire in the wood stove, of exploring the root cellar and retrieving things for Dean down there as he made dinner while he was too sore to go himself. Sam looked over the wheels of cheese Dean had made, the barrels full of salt pork, the rows and rows of canned vegetables, brightly colored on the shelves. “I can’t believe how much you know now,” Sam said as he brought up another thing Dean asked for. “I don’t know anything. I haven’t even gotten to read a book in all this time,” he said glumly.

“You learned how to control demons. I saw you were doing it, Sam. That’s the only reason it didn’t eat us, too--because of you.”

Sam nodded. “Yeah,” he sighed. “That’s what I spent the last year doing--learning how to control demons. And ... lots of supernatural things. They tried to call all kinds of things through me, and I was always able to hold them back ... until I heard Dennis hurting you.”

So that was what set off that whole chain of events. Dennis really had brought it all on himself. Dean thought of Dennis saying of slaughtering the nuns that it was bound to end thus, once it began. “That’s not nothin’, Sam.”

Sam brightened a little. “I guess not.”

“Anyway, I guess it’s a good thing I know how to do all this now, because we’re probably stuck here for a while.”

Sam seemed to like everything about this life. He loved the animals, he loved tending the garden, loved being outside and getting to feel the sun. Fishing in the cove together one warm afternoon, nothing but the sound of waves lapping against the wood and a light breeze to cool them, Dean couldn’t remember ever feeling so good. Just seeing Sam up and about and excited about life, starting to look like himself again, filled him with contentment.

Sam wouldn’t let Dean break the golden chains, insisting not only did they keep the demon locked away as long as he wasn’t inside the pentagram and his blood and hair weren’t on the altar, but he said Barbara had once said the chains would keep the demon blood from awakening on its own later. “I always had this feeling that someday something bad would happen. Something really bad ... and I’m just so glad there’s a way now to stop it,” he said. The chains got in his way, but he seemed to feel the price was worth it.

He was a little superstitious about giving up the robes at first, until as he put on his old clothes--which still fit, he was so skinny now--and other clothes Dean had made himself and grown out of, he decided the robes didn’t do anything important, and he wore whatever he wanted. He let his hair grow out immediately.

“What about when we get out of here, though?” Dean said. “I know hunters can be eccentric, but ... the ear chains are weird.”

“Maybe I can grow my hair out long and just tie it back when we’re alone. I could wear long sleeves. People could only see my rings then.”

Dean was glad Sam was talking about what would happen when they left. He seemed to like it so much here, Dean had been afraid he’d want to stay forever. Sam learned to tend the animals as Dean gave him instructions. It was a good thing Sam wasn’t just willing but eager to learn all this, as Dean couldn’t do half of what he usually did while his broken ribs healed. Every time Dean bathed--now in the nice metal tub Sam had bathed in all this time, that sat above a firepit so you could heat the water to just the right temperature first--afterward, Sam wrapped up his ribs as tight as he could with strips he made from his silk robes.

“We could do your idea now,” Dean said, “weave a big ‘HELP’ sign and hang it from the cliffs.”

Sam nodded eagerly. “Yeah! Spinning yarn is so fun.”

“Glad you think so. I hate it.”

“I’ll do it!” Sam said.

“Still, though ... all the time I was out there fishing and crabbing and making salt, I only ever saw two ships, and they were probably too far away to see a sign, no matter how big we made it.”

“It’s okay,” Sam said, unconcerned. He’d bounced right back from everything Dennis and Barbara did to him. He was no longer pale and winded only a week after their demise. Now he was even putting on muscle. Maybe it was just being free again at last to get to play and be a kid, but he seemed light, lighter than he had in his whole life, like a weight he’d felt since infancy had been lifted. Happy. Dean ... Dean felt happy, too. “You know everything about how to keep us alive here as long as we have to stay.”

“How long’s that gonna be?”

Sam looked up at him with that newly optimistic grin, indomitable. “Until something changes.”

~The End~


End file.
